If you use any of the preinstalled themes and the mandatory question attribute is enabled, a red asterisk will be shown next to the question. If you wish to hide it, please check these instructions.

Verfügbare Optionen:

An

Aus (Standardwert)

Validation (using regular expressions) (preg_validation)

Beschreibung

This option lets you specify a regular expression with which you can validate all the parts of a question.

If any question or subquestion value does not meet the validation requirements, the background colour of the text entry field will be changed to red so that users can easily see which parts of the question need to be corrected. Thus, you can do on-page validation. In this way you will not need to wait for the user to click on the submit button to validate the respective question.

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Hide tip (hide_tip)

Beschreibung

Most questions will usually include a tip that says "Please choose one of the following options" or a hint text on how to fill out the question. This attribute allows you to turn off or on this tips/hints.

These tips/hints include validation criteria messages (such as min/max number of answers, min/max/equals sum value). If hide_tip is enabled, these messages will be hidden. However, if the user enters invalid data, the tips will appear. They will be coloured in red, getting changed to green once the validation criteria are met.

Available options

On - the tips/hints are hidden;

Off (default).

Breite Eingabefeld (text_input_width)

Beschreibung

This attribute sets the width of the text input boxes (of the "wrapper" of the text input boxes). The input box is used to introduce an answer to the (sub)question. If the value of the width is sufficiently high, then the text input box will be displayed on the next line. Please note that this option does not set the size of the input or the width of the entire column!

Available options

Default: If selected, a default value will be allocated to this attribute in such a way to have both the label and its corresponding text input box on the same line. For example, if the text input box width is 41%, the value of the width of the text input box will be a value that allows both the label and the input box on the same line (58% in this case). If the width of text input box was higher than 58%, then the text input box would be displayed on the next line.

8%; 17%...92%, 100%: the bigger the selected value, the larger the width of the text input box.

Beispiel

If you wish to have the input part displayed below the subquestion/label, select the 100% option from the dropdown list.

Always hide this question (hidden)

Beschreibung

If enabled, the question will always be hidden - it will not be displayed to the survey participants. This function can be used in the following scenarios:

If you wish to prefill a question with a URL and you want not to have it displayed on the screen. This overrides any conditions used within the survey because the respective question will not even be embedded on the page.

If set to X (a random number), the users can submit the survey form if they select at least X checkboxes. If this option is utilised for ranking questions, this ensures that at least three items are ranked before allowing the respondent to submit the answers/survey.

Please note that if you use this attribute with Ranking questions, you have to set the question to non-mandatory. Otherwise, all the items need to be ranked which is counter-intuitive if you decide to use the min_answers function too.

Maximale Antworten (max_answers)

Beschreibung

It can be used to limit the total number of answers a user can select in a multiple choice question.

If set to 2, the user will only be able to check at most two checkboxes or one checkbox + fill the "Other" field (if any). For the Ranking question type, the participant would be able to select maximum two items.

Matrix Filter (array_filter)

Beschreibung

The Array filter setting allows you to use any multiple choice question to select or set which responses are displayed in a subsequent list, array or multiple choice question.

The subsequent questions can be filtered on any array question type, including:

The only exception is Array (Column), which can filter other questions, but not itself.

How to set a filter

To set a filter, enter the question code of a multiple options question in the array filter box of the question you are currently editing. The respective question will be used as the source of information for the current question, the selected answers from the previous question being retrieved and used as answer options for the current question. For example, if your source multiple option question code is "Q1", enter "Q1" into the 'Array Filter' box to start the filtering process of the answers. Only the answer options that are selected in question Q1 will be visible in the array_filter-ed question.

If you wish more questions to be filtered via this option, type the question codes in the box separated by semicolons (;).

The subquestion codes used in the first question must coincide with the subquestion codes from the second one. Otherwise, the array filter function will not filter the answers to the first question. Check the below example to better understand how the whole system works.

Kaskadierung

The selected options can be displayed in cascade. This means that you can select a question which filters another question, which filters another question, and so on.

Matrix Filter Beispiel

Let's take a look at the following example to better understand the power of this setting:

In the screenshot from above, we got two questions. The first one is a multiple short text question type, while the second one is an array dual scale question type. The answers you provide in the first question will be listed in the second one. Technically, the answers you provide to the subquestions from the first question are filtered and displayed in the second question.

The only exception is Array by column which can filter other questions, but it cannot be filtered.

How to set it up

Enter the question code of a multiple options question in the array exclusion filter box of the question you are currently editing. The respective question will be used as the source of information for the current question, the non-selected answers from the previous question being retrieved and used as answer options for the current question. For example, if your source multiple option question code is "Q1", enter "Q1" into the 'Array exclusion filter' box to start the filtering process of the answers. Only the answer options that are NOT selected in question Q1 will be visible in your question.

If you wish more questions to be filtered via this option, type the question codes in the box separated by semicolons (;).

The subquestion codes used in the first question must coincide with the subquestion codes from the second one. Otherwise, the array exclusion filter function will not filter the answers to the first question. Check the below example to better understand how the whole system works.

Cascading

The selected options can be displayed in cascade. This means that you can select a question which filters another question, which filters another question, and so on.

Beispiel

Let's see together the below example:

In the screenshot from above, we got two questions. The first one is a multiple choice question type, while the second one is a multiple choice with comments question type. The answers you provide in the first question will be excluded from the second one. For example, if you select the ComfortUpdate option (that has the subquestion code 'SQ1') and the Plugin option ('SQ4'), the 'SQ1' and the 'SQ4' subquestion correspondents from the second question will be excluded. In our screenshot, we can observe that only the unselected options in the first question and displayed in the second one.

Validierungsgleichung für die ganze Frage (em_validation_q)

Beschreibung

This is an equation that is used to validate the entire question (e.g, all of its parts collectively for a multi-answer question). If the question fails the validation criteria, then em_validation_q_tip message will be displayed (it uses the CSS style .error). This tip uses the .em_q_fn_validation CSS style, which is hidden by default within template.css.

The main difference between this feature and the subquestion validation equations (em_validation_sq option) is that for this feature, if the question (or question parts) fail validation, then an error message could be shown. For the subquestion validation, each text entry cell (e.g., in an array question type, but it can also be applied to single entry question types) will be styled so that the background color is (light) red.

Valid values

Any equation that makes use of the Expression Manager syntax, without surrounding curly braces.

Example

You want to collect demographic information from users via a multiple short text question, and you want to validate that the user has entered a valid email address and phone number.

This example shows how the question looks with invalid answers:

And here is what it looks like with one invalid answer:

Here is how you edit a question to enter that information:

And here is part of the Show Logic File output that lets you check the accuracy of your expression and ensure that there are no syntax errors:

As you can see, the validation equation tests that both the email and phone number are either empty or match a regular expression filter.

The validation tip only shows the warning message if the phone or email appears invalid.

Hint: In order to create complex validation messages, read about the usage of the Expression Manager.

If you wish to import the example from above into your LimeSurvey installation, download the following .lsq file: Em_validation_q_example.zip.

Hint: Remember, LimeSuvey uses the Perl syntax for regular expressions, so they should start and end with / (slash character)!

Slider initial value (slider_initial_value)

Description

If the slider option is enabled, you can use type in this field a value that will represent the default start value of the slider. By default, this value correspond to the slider's minimum value. To customize it, you may also use expressions. Please note that the custom value has to be calculated before the expression is displayed. For example, no custom value is displayed if the expression and the question and/or question answer codes used within the respective expression are displayed on the same page. If this happens, then the question attribute will inherit the value established in the "slider minimum value" field.

Attention : Please note that if the expression typed within the box contains an error, a logic error will be displayed to the user below the question.

Statistics

Show in public statistics (public_statistics)

Description

This attribute allows the survey administrator to chose if a particular question results should be displayed to the survey participants after they submitted the survey.

Note: To have the statistics displayed on the last page, do not forget to enable this functionality from the presentation & navigation settings. Otherwise, no statistics link will be displayed at the end of your survey.

The default setting for each question is 'Off' (=Do not show the question statistics to the respondents). You have to enable this for every single question if you want to show the survey statistics of that (those) particular question(s) to the survey participants after the survey submission.

Available options

On

Off (default)

Display chart (display_chart)

Description

This attribute allows the survey administrator to choose if a chart that contains the question results should be displayed to the survey participants after they filled out the survey.

Note: To have the chart displayed on the last page, you have to enable the following options:

Chart type (chart_type)

Description

This attribute allows the survey administrator to choose which type of chart will be displayed to the respondent once he/she finished filling out the survey.

Note: Do not forget to change the question and survey settings in order to have the charts displayed at the end on the survey. For more details, check the wiki section on the display chart question attribute.